(Closed) Please tell me I’m not the only one having kids at my formal wedding.

I haven’t seen any bees lately saying that they’re allowing kids at their formal receptions. Anyone besides me? I can totally see why you wouldn’t want to have kids at your reception, and I generally find them annoyances in most comparable situations, but I just think they’re so darn cute all dressed up and dancing.

Anyone else out there? And if so, are you having special activities/spaces for them? We have a million and one rooms at our disposal at our venue so we could have an entire kids’ room if we wanted, but I totally want to see them get their little kid boogie on and so don’t want to segregate them…hmm.

Also, as a guest, do you find yourself annoyed by kids at formal receptions? I don’t want to annoy my guests just because I like seeing little girls in dresses and little boys in tuxes. And the pics of brides bending down to talk to little girls. So precious. I think having one of myself doing that would help me convince people I’m not such a cold-hearted bitch.

You are not the only one having kids at a formal wedding 🙂 We are too, probably between 40-50 And we are getting married on New Years Eve. We love kids, and couldn’t imagine not sharing our day with them.

I don’t know if you’d call my wedding formal, because the venue is funky (an architectural artifacts shop) and I will be DIY-ing the cake, but everything else will be pretty formal. We are having kids although I was a little “eh” about it at first because, um, hundreds and hundreds of artifacts? The shop is high end, so even though some of it is of questionable taste, it’s still worth a lot.

In the end, I decided that we don’t know enough hyper kids for it to be a problem. The only two that might cause issues will be with older siblings who are used to being their keepers, haha. I do want to do a fun little kids table for them. I loved Mrs. Sprinkle’s kids’ table, that’s where I’m getting all my inspiration!

Our wedding is “destination”, since everyone has to fly in and stay the weekend. Fiance has lots of little ones on his side of the fmaily…(24 kids under the age of 10). We rented a room across the hall from the reception and hired professional babysitters to watch all the little dinkos. They’re bringing sleeping bags and the sitters provide toys and a TV and DVDs and they order pizzas.

I don’t mind kids at weddings too much, but 24 of them was more than I wanted. I surely don’t care about kids at OTHER people’s wedding, I just didn’t want them at my own. I’m sure your guests won’t mind.

We’re having kids at our formal wedding! I can’t imagine not inviting them (although I totally understand why others choose not to) since all of my family is Out of Town. If I didn’t invite kids, most of my family wouldn’t be able to come. The kids in our families are all well behaved, and I love seeing them all dressed up!

Future Mother-In-Law is really fighting me on the kid issue, and I’m looking forward to showing her how awesome the kids in my family are, haha.

I believe in the “weddings as cycle-of-life” events, so to me, having them at a formal wedding just makes sense culturally. Also, most of our guests are out-of-town, so I can’t imagine asking them to travel 2,000 miles AND find a place for their kids. We’ll have a kids’ table or some activities set up so that they have something to do.

ME ME ME!! I agree completely, and LOVE seeing kids at weddings. We are having about 15 kids, and are doing up gable boxes with a bunch of activities for each child (colouring book, crayons, playdoh, bubbles, dinky cars, slinky etc) all from the dollar store, but lots of stuff to keep them busy if they get busy!! ENJOY the children!

my wedding is not formal but im having kids in my wedding. we have a seven yo daughter that we love and is having a big part in our wedding. my brothers and his brothers all have kids, more than one. all of our friends have kids. i cant imagine my wedding without kids. we are both teachers and kids are part of our every day life

Thanks for the responses everyone–WHEW, so glad I am not alone on this and that at least not ALL of my guests will hate me for having kids at the reception.

lilyfaith, thanks for pointing out Mrs. Sprinkle’s kids’ table. She was one of my favorite bloggers (due in no small part to her photog’s many shots of kids acting randome, bored, playful, etc.–all the sorts of shots I love to see when I look at photographers’ work. oh, and the vegan dessert table…) and somehow I totally missed the kids’ table post!!! I love it too, especially because I regularly consume that brand of organic lollipops AND the single serving sized chocolate soymilks she had on the table haha.

And VirginiaMarie I think you might be right about hiring a babysitter for them in another room. Like I said, we have lots of space in our venue and heck, we could have them in a room across the hall with a babysitter and then occasionally pull them in to dance and mingle amongst the stuffy older folks to lighten everyone up, haha. I just know they probably wouldn’t be entertained for all 5 hours of the reception, while the adults talk and drink and dance like old people.

@gionnetto: both my family and FI’s have stayed in touch with their heavy Italian roots, so I hope that means a lot of them will share your sentiments! I agree with what oyster was saying–for my wedding at least, I want it to really feel like a celebration of a monumental part of a life cycle, and the presence of kids really drives that home.

I don’t know if my wedding is formal, but it is pretty traditional. We are definitely having kids. Of course I am an elementary school teacher so maybe I’m just used to kid behavior. Plus I remember going to family weddings as a kid and loving them. Getting a picture with the bride was like getting a picture with the Queen of England. 🙂

we arent but the babysitter idea was something we toyed with since its an Out of Town wedding for practically everyone. if you have the space you might think of just having a room with some movies playing some coloring books, etc to keep them occupied if they start melting down in the reception hall. weddings are only so interesting to kids until they get tired or bored.

also think of having space if there are any nursing mothers in attendance?

I can’t imagine not having/wanting kids at any wedding. I just have never been to a wedding like that — ever.

That said, I do like the option of having a kid’s room and have seen them done before. I think it provides a nice option for both parents and kids, who may not want to be at the dancing/party part the entire time.